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Electronic
Canterbury Tales - Kankedort.Net Index Page
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The Canterbury
Tales in Middle English
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The Canterbury
Tales in Translation
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General
Historical & Cultural Backgrounds
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Sources,
Analogues, & Related Texts
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Online Notes &
Commentary
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Online Articles
& Books
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Student Projects
& Essays
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Online
Bibliography
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Syllabi & Course
Descriptions
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Images &
Multimedia
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Audio Files &
Language Helps
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Potpourri
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Additional
Resources
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Scholar's
Dozen
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What's New? Recent Additions to the ECT
Web Resources by Tale
Electronic
Canterbury Tales - Kankedort.Net Index Page
Fragment I / Group A
The General Prologue
The Knight's Tale
The Miller's Prologue &
Tale
The Reeve's Prologue & Tale
The Cook's Prologue & Tale
Fragment II / Group B1
The Man of Law's
Introduction, Prologue, Tale, & Epilogue
Fragment III /
Group D
The Wife of Bath's
Prologue & Tale
The Friar's Prologue & Tale
The Summoner's
Prologue
& Tale
Fragment IV /
Group E
The
Clerk's Prologue & Tale
The Merchant's Prologue,
Tale, & Epilogue
Fragment V / Group F
The
Squire's Introduction & Tale
The Franklin's
Prologue
& Tale
Fragment VI /
Group C
The Physician's Tale
The Pardoner's Introduction,
Prologue, & Tale
Fragment VII /
Group B2
The Shipman's Tale
The Prioress's Prologue
& Tale
The
Prologue & Tale
of Sir Thopas
The Tale of Melibee
The Monk's Prologue & Tale
The Nun's Priest's Prologue,
Tale, & Epilogue
Fragment VIII /
Group G
The
Second Nun's Prologue & Tale
The Canon's Yeoman's
Prologue & Tale
Fragment IX /
Group H
The Manciple's
Prologue & Tale
Fragment X /
Group I
The Parson's Prologue
& Tale
The Retraction
The Electronic Canterbury Tales:
Troilus
and Criseyde
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An Online Compendium and Companion
to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales
WHAT'S NEW?
The
Prioress's Tale
1. In Middle English
The Words
of the Host to the Prioress, the Prioress's
Prologue, and the Prioress's
Tale at the UVa Electronic Text Center.
Read the
Prioress's Prologue and Tale in the context of Fragment
VII - Group B2.
2. In Modern English Translation
Scott
Gettman's edition of the Canterbury
Tales (Electronic Literature Foundation) is accessible by individual tale &
available in a variety of formats: Middle English, Modern English, Facing Page,
& Interpolated - Glossed (frames; from unknown base text).
- Although unsuitable for formal research or college work, the
ELF is the best online version for younger readers and those unfamiliar with Middle
English. Easily navigable, and the Middle English glosses are very helpful.
The Litrix Reading Room translation
of the Canterbury Tales features rhyming couplets.
Sinan Kökbugur's helpfully glossed hypertext Middle English rendition of the complete Canterbury Tales is available at the Librarius page. Use the Table of
Contents in the left frame to click on a specific Tale, and difficult terms and phrases
are glossed in the lower frame.
3. Historical & Cultural Backgrounds
See Julia
Bolton Holloway's original research, for as she says, "Poor Second Nun!
Who thus becomes a true saint! Chaucer and his wife were honoured by the
city of Norwich. Norwich and Lincoln shared in the blood libel tale
Chaucer has the Prioress tell. Benedictine Carrow Priory, just outside
Norwich walls, had just such a Prioress, who in Julian's time even
harboured a murderer. I did a study of it, visited the remains, just the
terribly grand Tudor house left that a later Prioress had built for
herself there, and this
research is on the
web. What could help too is the
essay on Julian and Judaism,
as well as the essay on the
Prioress and the Second
Nun."
The Prioress's Tale evidences one of the most pernicious aspects of
medieval culture: Its pervasive antisemitism. So, the tale explicitly
invokes the multifaceted relationship of Christianity and Judaism.
Part of Paul Halsall's extensive Internet
Medieval Source Book, the Internet
Jewish History Source Book houses an extensive collection of primary
sources related to the Jewish
Middle Ages. Some of the extensive
listing of documents under Christian Anti-Semitism / Latin Christianity,
relating specifically to England include (lightly edited):
Continental and Papal pronouncements
include:
Relations between Christians and Jews in
England are illustrated by the following. (I've slightly edited and
rearranged some of Halsall's links here for their relevance to
England):
- Gilbert Crispin: Disputation
of a Jew with a Christian about the Christian Faith, before 1096
- Anselm of Canterbury: How
to Treat a Convert, before 1100
- Contact
between English Jews and Christians: Two Twelfth-century Views
- An
Israelite Bishop without Guile, c. 1168
- Gerald of Wales: A
Witty Jew, c. 1185
- Henry II of England: Concerning
Loans From The Jews
- The
Expulsion of the Jews from France, 1182 (Account by Rigord from
the Gesta Philippi Augusti).
- Richard I of England: Charter
by Which Many Liberties are Granted and Confirmed to the Jews, 22
March, 1190
- English Jewry is Organised: The
Ordinances of the Jews, 1194
- Appointment
of an Archpriest of the Jews in England, July 1199
- King John of England and the Jews: Charters,
c.1201
Music figures prominently in the plot of the Prioress's Tale. See Gary
Rich's sublime Ars
Subtilior. Music of the late Medieval period and the generous list of
links there.
4. Sources, Analogues, & Related Texts
TEAMS Middle English Text
Series (Russell Peck, URochester) houses a number of lesser known and
hard to find medieval texts in helpful student editions. A generous and fascinating
selection not to be missed! Each selection includes a scholarly introduction
and full notes. Some of the selections related to the Prioress's Tale
include:
- Middle English Marian Lyrics (ed. Karen
Saupe),
Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1999.
- The Book of Margery Kempe (ed.
Lynn Staley), Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval
Institute Publications, 1996.
"All
TEAMS texts are under copyright, whether in hard copy or in electronic
form. The on-line texts provided here are meant for individual use only.
To download and make multiple copies for course use, you must have
permission from the managing editor of Medieval
Institute Publications."
Read an
associated tale from the Life of William of
Norwich (12th century), whose death was also blamed on the "blood libel"
legend--the anti-Semitic belief that Jews kidnapped and killed Christian children for
illicit purposes.
D. L.
Ashliman provides a number of anti-Semitic folktales from around Europe, medieval and
modern, on his Anti-Semitic Legends.
A number of these are translated from 19th century German sources. You might also like to
see the folktales of the Singing Bones,
wherein the body parts of murder victims cry out or sing for justice.
Harvard Classics (vol. 40), English
Poetry I, From Chaucer to Gray reproduces a number of traditional (and
some) medieval ballads, including Hugh
of Lincoln
The
Oxford Book of Ballads, ed. Arthur Quiller-Couch (1910) includes
dozens of traditional (and some medieval) ballads, including some that
bear upon themes in the Prioress's Tale:
5. Online Notes & Commentary
Discussion and links concerning the Prioress's Prologue and Tale
on Larry D. Benson's superlative Geoffrey
Chaucer Page (Harvard). Includes e-texts of scholarly essays, sources and ancillary
texts, and capsule discussions of key issues. Some of the items related to the
Prioress's Tale include:
See a
number of related Tales
of the Virgin from the 12th and 13th Century (Paul Halsall, IMSB).
Read articles on figures related to the Prioress's Tale from the 1913 ed.
of the Catholic Encyclopedia:
- Holy Innocents / Childermass
- Hugh of Lincoln
- William of Norwich
6. Online Books & Articles
The
Google Library
Project has made a number of venerable older (and out of copyright)
works available as fully downloadable (and quite large) .pdf files.
These include:
While these older works are
vitally important for their historical value and their place in the
development of the history of Chaucerian criticism, they should be
supplemented with current textual and critical studies.
A number of titles from the U of
California Press's E-Scholarship initiative deal with anti-Semitism
and the legacy of Christian - Jewish (and Muslim) relations in the
medieval and early modern period, especially in Spain. See the
following:
- Bar-Kochva, Bezalel. Pseudo-Hecataeus
on the Jews: Legitmizing the Jewish Diaspora. (Berkeley: U of
California P, 1997).
- Burns, Robert I., S. J. Jews
in the Notarial Culture: Latinate Wills in Mediterranean Spain,
1250–1350. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1996).
- Chazan, Robert. Daggers of
Faith: Thirteenth-Century Christian Missionizing and Jewish Response. (Berkeley: U
of California P, 1991).
- Chazan, Robert. European Jewry and
the First Crusade. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1987).
- Chazan, Robert. God, Humanity, and
History: The Hebrew First Crusade Narratives. (Berkeley: U of
California P, 2000).
- Chazan, Robert. Medieval Stereotypes
and Modern Antisemitism. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1997).
- Cohen, Jeremy. Living Letters of the
Law: Ideas of Jews in Medieval Christianity. (Berkeley: U of
California P, 1999).
- Meyerson, Mark D. The Muslims
of Valencia in the Age of Fernando and Isabel. (Berkeley: U
of California P, 1991).
The articles from Cultural
Frictions: Medieval Cultural Studies in Post-Modern Contexts Conference Proceedings
(27-28 October 1995) are online. Though not about the Prioress's Tale, the following
article deals with some of the same issues of anti-Semitism and violence:
Essays in Medieval Studies
features full-text articles from the proceedings of the Illinois Medieval Association,
online version edited by Allen J. Frantzen (Loyola - Chicago), including:
7. Student Projects & Essays
Anniina Jokkinen's strikingly beautiful and highly useful Luminarium includes a substantial list of
professional and student essays on a number of medieval authors, and individual pages on,
Chaucer, the Gawain Poet, Langland, Margery Kempe, and Julian of Norwich.
Jokkinen also compiles a number of resources by Canterbury Tale: The
Prioress's Tale
8. Online Bibliography
9.
Syllabi & Course
Descriptions
10. Images & Multimedia
The Massacre of the Innocents (from Matthew 2) is a subtext of the
Prioress's Tale, and images of the Massacre (or Slaughter) of the
Innocents are pervasive in medieval culture. See the following:
11. Language Helps & Audio Files
Sample
audio files (.wav, .au, .aiff) from the Prioress's
Tale, recorded at Campion College, University of Regina, 1989, and at the 7th
International Congress of the New Chaucer Society, University of Kent at Canterbury, 1990,
are available from the Chaucer Studio (Paul Thomas, Brigham Young).
12. Potpourri
13. The
Next Step
Google Academic Resources
Google Scholar
Google Book
Google Custom
Search:
I welcome your
suggestions for suitable websites. Please be patient as
I tune the search terms.
The
Poor Medieval Scholar's
Electronic Bookshelf
and
The
Electronic Canterbury Tales
Bookshop
This subpage of
the Electronic Canterbury Tales offers several
features:
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The Poor Scholar's
Electronic Bookshelf: No cost books (generally
older studies) available via the Google Books project and other
public online projects.
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The ECT Bookshop:
Scroll down to the Electronic
Canterbury Tales Bookshop (with recommended titles) hosted by
Amazon.com.
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Online Search Links
will take you to
major online booksellers and homepages to lesser-known but
excellent specialty bookshops.
I'll cross-list the
recommended Google Books on the appropriate webpage throughout the Electronic
Canterbury Tales under
Online Articles
& Books (on the expanded Electronic
Canterbury Tales - Kankedort.Net Index Page) and also detail them on the webpages devoted to specific Canterbury Tales or associated
pages).
This will be an ongoing
project, so check back periodically for new finds!
How to Document
Print & Electronic Sources:
The Chaucer Pedagogy
Documentation Primer
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The
Poor Medieval Scholar's Electronic Bookshelf
(no cost, older academic books, in .pdf
form from the
Google Library Project)
The
Electronic Canterbury Tales
Bookshop
(recommended books for the study of
Chaucer and Late-Medieval England, hosted by Amazon.com)
The
Kankedort
Gift Shoppe
(with many serious and some silly offerings for the medievalist in your
life)
About This Website
ECT
Revision
History:
What's New?
Headings,
Organization,
&
Criteria for Inclusion
Additional
Chaucer Pages in The Electronic Canterbury Tales
Chaucer the Pilgrim-Narrator & Author
Chaucer's "Orphan" Pilgrims
- Those without a Tale
The
Frame Tale, Later Continuations,
&
Chaucerian Apocrypha
Manuscripts,
Printed Editions, & Electronic Texts
Electronic
Chaucer Texts:
What's Available Online?
Chaucer
in / and Popular Culture
Troilus
and Criseyde
Documentation Primer
Chaucer Pedagogy Page
Major Medieval Conferences Websites
International
Congress on Medieval Studies (Western Michigan Univ. (Kalamazoo, MI)
International
Medieval Congress, Univ. of Leed (Leeds England)
If you're looking for it,
Powell's probably has it!
And if Powell's doesn't
have it, AbeBooks does!
Barnes & Noble is
Good for Current Offerings
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